The Last Good-Bye
by lost-in-elysium
Summary: Gale returns to District Twelve one last time. One-shot.


**The Last Goodbye**

 **A Hunger Games Fanfiction**

 **Summary:** Gale returns to District Twelve one last time. One-shot.

 **/!\ Warnings:** Mild language.

 **Disclaimer:** We own nothing!

 **A/N:** We apologize in advance for any spelling/grammatical errors.

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"Katniss, open up."

Silence.

I knocked three more times. " _Please._ "

Still nothing. _Perhaps another time...which neither Katniss or I have._

I turned to leave, but a tentative creak from behind stopped me.

She had propped herself against the doorjamb, arms crossed and eyes narrowed, the brown wisps of her slapdash braid framing a face haggard from hardship but no less beautiful, steel eyes blazing with a fervor that could set fires. Maybe I deserved it. Our friendship died with Prim, but my hope its remnants could be salvaged hadn't. Loose ends needed tying, and until they were, I wasn't going anywhere.

"What do you want?"

I bit my tongue. _Is that how you greet an old friend?_ "I'm leaving..." A sudden, inexplicable twinge of disappointment flustered me as I scoured her face and found nothing. What more did I expect? "...And I wanted to say good-bye."

"Well, good-bye."

Before she shut me out for good, I wedged my foot between the door and frame. "Come on, Katniss. You know I'm here to talk."

She glowered at leather boots still serviceable after years of use. "There's nothing to talk about."

"If you don't want to talk, fine. But at least listen."

Reluctantly, the Mockingjay emerged from behind the door, closing it with a soft _click_ so as not to disturb the eerie tranquility of the Village. Her arms resumed their places over her chest while she wrapped a threadbare shawl around her stooped shoulders like a cocoon. "What do you want?"

"We both know things between us aren't what they used to be." I recited my lines verbatim. "I know; it's been hard since you and Peeta won the Games and Prim's death, but we must move on. It's been hard on all of us. We can't let past tragedies overshadow the future. I hope we can put everything behind us and forget -"

"Forget?" Her eyes flashed. " _Forget?_ Gale, how can I forget the Games, that Prim is dead?"

"You can't, Katniss, and I can only imagine the hell you've been through the past few years."

"Damn right you can only imagine what I've been through. Millions watched the Games, but not one can truly understand what it was like unless you stepped into that arena and lived it yourself. You just don't know, Gale - the memories...they haunt not only my nightmares, but my dreams - my waking hours. Every second of every day." Her body and voice quivered. "And now you're telling me to forget anything happened? It isn't that easy."

"You know I don't mean that," I hastily amended. _Too late._ The damage was done. "You're taking my words out of context -"

"I'm not!"

I flinched. _How can the words sound perfect in my head, but not aloud?_

"You're not listening to me." She repelled from my touch like we were two magnet ends with the same polarity - always slipping out of alignment no matter how hard you forced them. My arm dropped to my side; this was not going as well as I planned, as I hoped.

"I'm listening, Gale," Tears welled in her eyes and my own threatened to fall. Did she mourn _us_ as much as I? "My sister is dead because of you. She'd still be alive if -"

A swell of frustration consumed me. "If what?" No answer. " _If what?_ You wanted a revolution and got one! When people fight for freedom, _anything_ , they die. We fought a war, and all wars have casualties. Why can't you get that? I hate to break it to you, but freedom isn't free, and you, unfortunately, paid a higher price than others. We all did." I glanced away, gripped by pain the truth inflicted not only on Katniss, but on me. Diminishing Prim, sweet Prim, to a statistic was callous, but how history remembered her.

I had crossed the point of no return.

" _Go_ , Gale." Her dismissive wave boiled my blood. "I don't understand you anymore. Why work with the people we've grown up to despise? Remember all the rants in the woods? Of how you despised the Capital? Why would you want to go there?"

"There's nothing left of District Twelve anymore! Look around you!" I swept my arm across a land bereft of life, hope. Dreams. Only the Victor's Village had been spared from the bombs - the _coup de grace_ for a population decimated by famine and disease that transformed our beloved forest into a sea of ash, drowning corpses, their sight and stench ingrained in memory. How did Katniss live with it? I never could. "It'll take years to recover. District Twelve was nothing before and certainly is nothing now. The Capital changed since Snow died and the Games were abolished." I stepped toward her and she didn't budge, rekindling hope. "I want a new life, with you in it."

"The Capital will always be the Capital to me, no matter who's in charge," Katniss replied. "I'll always despise them for what they did. District Twelve may not be what it once was, but it's home..." She cocked her head to the side. "Or did you forget?"

Why stay when we can better our lives, _ourselves_ , in the Capital? Panem hailed her a hero, a beacon of hope - _deified_ her, almost - yet she chose to dwell in the past rather than lead the charge into a brighter future.

"Come with me," I said. "It's only a matter of moving in; I already accepted a job there. I can provide for us. We can get and stay out of this place...forever."

"Leave Peeta? District Twelve? After everything you said to me?" She scoffed with an incredulous shake of her head. "I don't think so."

My jaw clenched until it throbbed. _Peeta._ He derailed any hope of a future with Katniss - the substance of forsaken dreams. Any amorous - let alone _amicable_ \- feelings toward her were gone, but the pain lingered - of knowing that, after years vying for her affections, I lost them to the baker's son. We were kindred spirits fated to be together; all of District Twelve thought so, she and I included.

But that was not how it came to be, and that killed me.

Convincing Katniss otherwise was a Sisyphean task no longer worth pursuing. "Then I feel sorry for you." She drew her eyebrows low over orbs of smoldering smoke, pursed lips smothering a retort. "If you think I will drop on my knees and beg for forgiveness, you're wrong because I know my intentions were pure. They're not something to apologize for, especially to you."

Her features hardened into stone, cold as ice. "Good-bye, Gale."

"Good-bye." With that said, I turned my back to her and walked away never, _ever_ , looking back.

That was the end of us.

 _The End_

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 **A/N:** Thanks for reading! Any feedback including constructive criticism is immensely appreciated.


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